


The Curator

by Radiolaria



Series: Meta Essays [5]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Archived From Tumblr, Archived From onaperduamedee Blog, Cliche, Etymology, Fanwork Research & Reference Guides, Gen, Libraries, Meta Essay, Nonfiction, Recurring Theme
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-08
Updated: 2018-12-08
Packaged: 2019-09-14 13:07:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 518
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16913403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Radiolaria/pseuds/Radiolaria
Summary: A look back at the Eleventh Doctor as a librarian figure across his tenure.





	The Curator

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Jan. 25, 2014 on [onaperduamedee](https://onaperduamedee.tumblr.com/post/74509053945/you-should-be-in-a-museum-5x06-vampires-in)

**“You should be in a museum.” 5x06 - Vampires in Venice**

**museum** (n.)

 

> 1610s, "the university building in Alexandria," from Latin museum " **library** , study," from Greek mouseion "place of study, library or museum, **school of art or poetry** ," originally "a seat or shrine of the Muses," from Mousa "Muse" (see muse (n.)). Earliest use in reference to English institutions was of libraries (e.g. the British Museum); sense of " **building to display objects** " first recorded 1680s. (Source: [etymonline](http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=museum))

As a prologue to Eleven’s era, Silence in The Library/Forest of the dead displays a library that is really a _live museum_ : 4022 people saved at the beginning, River Song and her team’s conscience at the end (River becomes literally a _libraria,_ a “female librarian, copyist”, but also a “library”, in latin).

Throughout Eleven’s tenure, museums are used to preserve: River’s message to the Doctor in Time of the Angels, Amy and the Daleks in The Big Bang. Vincent and the Doctor’s and The Day of the Doctor’s museums can be seen as doors, through paintings: to the locked past, to the artist’s psyche. In the end, the purpose is to _preserve_ Gallifrey and the painter’s sanity –and on the side, Rory’s memory.

The latter episodes present a side of preserving that can work as a metaphor to History and rewriting it, a concept essential to Eleven’s era: Vincent of the Doctor is about a failure to undo what has happened, but time was changed, as the tiniest touches in the paintings show. Time can be rewritten. Later, the Day of the Doctor shows a successful rewriting; this time the lack of changes in the piece presented –Gallifrey falls no more- working as a protection of said change. History cannot always be rewritten.

Considering the amount of rewriting and erasing the Doctor has been committing for the past three series, this is a concept he needed to understand to become what he said he wanted to be: a _curator._

Of a museum, he and we assume.

But could the Doctor ever learn a lesson, to become a preserver, rather than a writer? One cannot rewrite History. Or rather, _he_ cannot rewrite History. Amy, Clara, River have been doing it for long. And he rewrites them, a little. It’s always about people in the end. _Curare_ in latin means “to take care of, to watch after, to treat”, even if the administrative meaning exists. Twelve year old in the heart, he would not accept an appointment. But he could accept people.

When the clock strikes twelve, as a consequence, the paintings and items the Doctor is looking after are toys and drawings, courtesy of the village children who look up to him. Curator of hearts? A _librarius_ in Saint Jerome’s _Epistulae_ means an “elementary teacher”. As if from his prologue, his last page was written. Except as River’s became a copyist and librarian, he became a teacher and curator of a museum of young objects –fanarts even-, telling his philosophy and stories, guardian of a temple dedicated to art and creation –and himself.

Back to the start, to the Muses temple.


End file.
